


Bukuro

by blueraven1340



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Raijin Days, Raira
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2020-06-26 11:30:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 14,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19767295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueraven1340/pseuds/blueraven1340
Summary: Ikebukuro hides many stories, and of them all, Izaya has his buried deepest. But Shizuo's new girlfriend resurfaces old feelings, forcing Izaya to face a past he'd nearly forgotten. What happened between them, anyway, and what did that mean for their future?





	1. Goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I'm back with another Shizaya fic. I have a few chapters already written for this one, so updates should be regular for now. Let me know what you think

Ikebukuro was quiet tonight. Well, as much as it could be quiet. In actuality, it wasn’t quiet at all, but in this part of Tokyo, on the balcony of _his_ apartment, the world was so quiet, Izaya heard the whisper of the white cigarette smoke leaving his lips. As if to honor this, he spoke in murmurs, his voice so quiet only the man next to him could hear.

“I heard you got yourself a girlfriend.”

Shizuo looked over at him. He blew his own cloud of smoke out into the quiet night.

“Yeah,” he said.

Izaya leaned forward on the railing, looking down at the streets below.

“Don’t do that,” Shizuo said, but he didn’t stop him. They never touched each other when they met up like this. Not even brushing shoulders or looking too long. Because that felt like touching too.

Izaya leaned back.

“What’s her name?” he said.

Shizuo scowled.

“You already know everything, don’t you?”

Izaya smiled. He took a pull from his cigarette.

“Yes, but I want to hear it from you.”

Shizuo gave him a look, and Izaya stared back.

“Her name’s Vorona,” he said. He looked away. “She’s sweet.”

“And pretty.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Shizuo sighed out smoke. Izaya stretched, yawning.

“I suppose that means we won’t be meeting up anymore.”

Shizuo frowned. “Why not?”

Izaya laughed. He put his hands down and leaned on the railing again, looking.

“Izaya,” Shizuo said.

Izaya leaned farther.

“If I fell like this,” he said. “My head would hit the pavement, right there. I don’t think the force would be enough to kill me, but who knows? Maybe I’d lie there for a little while, looking up at you. Or would you be running down after me? Would you make it in time? Which would be the better choice, to see me in my last moments, or spend it trying to save me?”

Izaya straightened up. Shizuo looked frozen, almost comically so. He was staring, and Izaya imagined he knew what the beast was thinking in that moment. Maybe they were even thinking the same thing.

On the street below them, a car honked at a rogue salaryman. Shizuo blinked. As if on cue, they turned away from each other. Izaya put out his cigarette on the railing, and after a few seconds, he dropped it off the balcony. It fell, squarely, on the salaryman’s head.

He looked up at them, yelling and gesturing.

“Time to leave, I think.”

“Izaya.”

Izaya looked. Shizuo’s gold-brown eyes were on him again, holding that same intensity he had when fighting, arguing, fucking. It sent a shiver through him. He felt it in his fingers, in his dick. He imagined, for a second, that they were going to kiss. That they were going to, at least, kiss.

“See you later,” he said.

Izaya smiled.

“Bye-bye.”


	2. Gakuran

Students trickled into Raijin Academy Middle School, arms around their friends, bags on their shoulders, the mass of black uniforms recognizable even from a distance. Teachers hurried them along, not that any of their charges cared. They still had time before the first bell.

Izaya looked down at them from the rooftop. Another new year at Raijin. Just one more until graduation, then three years in high school and all these black uniforms would be released into the world as adults, if they hadn’t left the system already.

This, right here, was the future. They just didn’t know it yet.

Izaya laughed. Out of his own uniform, he took out a switchblade. Black as his clothes and just as plain, the weapon was wicked only in its sharp edge, but that’s all he’d wanted it for. Hashimoto Makoto, a third year today, offered it up as payment for his gambling debts last year, which, in all honesty, hadn’t amounted to much. Izaya accepted it on a whim.

For a second, he admired how it caught the sun. He wondered, not for the first time, why Hashimoto-kun had this on him and how. What that said about him and his values, what that said about his impression of Izaya. He wondered if he could kill one of those students down there, if he dropped it now. He wondered how his or her friends would react.

He put it away.

Maybe he’d stop by the vending machine before first period. There was a new juice flavor he’d been wanting to try. Humming, Izaya smiled and turned around.

A student stared back at him. A handsome, dark-haired someone, with light-brown eyes and surprise written all over his face.

Izaya stopped humming. He felt his smile sharpen.

“Hello,” he said. “I don’t believe we’ve met before.”

The boy glared at him. Izaya raised his eyebrows at this. Was it something he’d said?

“I’m new,” the boy spat out.

That much was obvious. Izaya knew most people in the school, one way or another, and not many of them came up to the rooftop. It was forbidden, after all. Izaya ambled closer.

“Are you lost?” he said. “If so, I can help you find your classroom.”

“I’m not lost.”

“You’re not?” Izaya stopped just in front of this new stranger. The boy was scowling now. “Then you should know it’s against the rules for students to be here.”

He looked Izaya up and down. “You’re a student.”

Astute observation. Izaya longed to applaud the idiot.

“Yes, I am,” he said. “And I’m about to leave. You’re welcome to join me.”

“No thanks.”

Izaya resisted the urge to scoff. Clearly, something had crawled up this boy’s ass and died a horrible, gruesome death. Or maybe he could make that happen for him in the nearby future. Izaya opened his mouth to remark on this, perhaps to even suggest a doctor the boy could see about the horrible condition, but then he happened to glance at the door.

Ah. Of course.

Smiling, Izaya shrugged.

“Suit yourself,” he said.

The boy kept his glaring, light eyes on him all the way to the door. There, Izaya looked back.

“See you later, Shizu-chan!”

He closed the door on Heiwajima Shizuo’s shocked face, laughing. A prideful, violent idiot with less than a two percent chance of entering into higher education, if the rumors were to be believed. Also, a bad fucking attitude. Izaya wondered what this rude, destructive idiot would do, when he learned the door locked from the inside.

Izaya’s new class had several familiar faces, some of which even knew him. A boy with thick glasses and hair like an octopus wiener waved from the front, but, rolling his eyes, Izaya made for the back seat by the window. The boy joined him.

“Hey!” he said. “We’re in the same class again!”

Izaya smiled.

Kishitani Shinra. A complete oddball who, discounting his equally odd father and mysterious neighbor, had just one friend in this school of 857. Orihara Izaya. They had met last year, when Shinra roped him into becoming Vice President of his Biology Club. He intrigued Izaya, to say the least.

“Please take care of me this year as well,” he said.

Shinra just rolled his eyes. He scooted his desk closer, glasses glinting in the sun.

“Did you hear?” he said.

Izaya raised his eyebrows. “Did I hear what?”

“The transfer student! He’s in _our_ class.”

Of course he’d heard. Izaya smiled, leaning in.

“Apparently, he got expelled from his last school for putting his teacher in a coma,” he said.

It was one of the milder rumors circling about the Beast of Kaisei Middle School. He’d also heard that this Beast turned rabid during the full moon, that he ripped the eyes out of a classmate, that he was connected to the yakuza, that he was a yakuza head himself.

Shinra smiled too.

“I want to meet him so bad!” he said. “Hey, let’s be friends with him, Izaya. Before anyone else takes him.”

Izaya held back a laugh. Instead of jumping with excitement, like Shinra, half the class seemed terrified. The other half looked just as scared, but also a little eager to see this Beast, this legend made of rumors that just couldn’t, but might, be true.

“I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that,” he said.

Shinra frowned. He opened his mouth to ask what Izaya had meant when someone, Fukushima Kenshi, a second year like them and an average poker player at best, appeared in the doorway. He was panting, sweating, looking around wildly.

Everyone stared.

“Izaya!” he said. “Is Orihara Izaya here?”

A good number of people snapped their heads towards him, some Izaya had never even met before. Interesting.

Izaya waved.

“Kenshi-kun!” he said. “What a nice surprise. What brings you here?”

When Kenshi spotted him, he gestured to him frantically.

“Izaya, you have to come quick, he says he’s going to tear up the whole building!”

Murmurs rose, and friends gave each other anxious glances. Izaya cocked his head.

“Who?”

He knew who.

“The Kaisei Beast, that’s who! He’s gone crazy! He says he’s looking for you or something!”

Ah, so the beast learned his name. Either the idiot got lucky, or Izaya had built a larger reputation for himself than he’d thought. More importantly: how did he escape the rooftop so fast?

Shinra gave him a curious look, but everyone else turned worried. A girl near him, Fujikawa Chieko, stepped towards him, wide eyes growing wider.

“Don’t go, Orihara-kun!” she said. “I heard he killed someone at his last school.”

The girl next to her, Suzuki Kozue, rolled her eyes.

“If he killed someone, he wouldn’t be here, Chieko.”

“What do _you_ know, Kozue…”

Kozue and Chieko-chan continued to argue. They were widely considered the prettiest girls in their grade, and had been the best of friends at the end of last year. Evidently, something had happened over winter to change that, something probably related to Kozue-chan’s sparkling, new necklace. First guess? A boy.

Izaya filed this away for later.

“I’ll go,” he said.

At Chieko’s look, he smiled and patted her shoulder. Several boys in the class shot him jealous glances, especially – ah, Togawa Seiji, the four-eyed otaku who confessed to her last year.

“No need to worry, Fujikawa-san,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”

Chieko blushed. Kozue, along with just about everyone else in the class, including Seiji-kun, scowled.

Shinra jumped up. “I’ll go with you!” he said.

The Beast and the Mad Scientist together in one setting? Now, that’d be interesting.

Izaya shrugged.

“Sure.”

No one tried to stop Shinra from going, which irked him a bit. Did people think Shinra was stronger than him? Tougher? He’d figure it out later.

Kenshi looked relieved.

“He’s on this floor last I saw, the other side of the school. You’d better hurry.”

Izaya stood up, taking his time. He looked at Kenshi as he passed.

“You’re not coming?”

Kenshi looked at him like he was crazy. Izaya smiled at this, shrugging.

“See you later, then,” he said.

Shizuo was easy to find. He wasn’t far from their classroom, and he was very, very loud. He and Shinra approached the sounds of screaming students, frantic teachers, Shizuo’s own yells, and what sounded like serious property damage.

Looked like the rumors had more truth to them than he’d thought.

Shizuo didn’t notice them, at first. He was too busy interrogating a frightened student in the corner of classroom 2-E. Harada Ritsu, a boy who, in the dark, held a passing resemblance to Izaya. He’d wet his pants.

Ignoring the trembling students and teachers around him, Izaya hopped up on the only upright desk. Shinra hung back, watching from the front row seats, as it were.

“Hello, Shizu-chan,” he said.

Shizuo whirled around, like a beast training on its prey, and, seeing Izaya, he growled.

“IZAYA!”

Izaya stared back. He wasn’t sure, yet, what game he was playing. All he knew as he looked at this brute, this monster, this wild thing that looked so intent on ripping him limb from limb, was that he could feel the blood beating in his chest and against his skin, a tattoo that hummed in his ears. He found himself smiling.

“Long time no see.”

Afterwards was a blur. Shizuo pounced, and Izaya never before had a 50kg thirteen-year-old boy rush at him, headlong, but he’d excelled in just about every sport under the sun in elementary school. He dodged, ran, and after that, it was almost easy. They ended up leaving the school grounds. Neither of them made it back, but no one blamed Izaya, after, for skipping his entire first day of class.

Outside, Izaya felt free to pull out his knife. He didn’t manage to reach the beast – he was too busy running away – but it felt exhilarating to know that, in his hand, he held a weapon that could kill.

It also seemed to enrage Shizuo further, and that was exhilarating in its own right.

Between buildings, down busy roads, through empty shops, and over crowds of people. They toured Tokyo, just the two of them, leaving a trail of destruction behind.

The chase ended abruptly, when Izaya managed to jump over a gap in the ceiling of some rusted building, and Shizuo didn’t. He fell, knocked his head, and for several, chilling moments, Izaya thought he’d died. When he made it down to Shizuo’s level, however, he found the beast still breathing.

He called an ambulance. Afterwards, he observed Shizuo’s listless body.

The Beast of Kaisei Middle School, knocked out on the grimy floor of an uninhabited building. He was shorter than Izaya thought he’d be – smaller, in a way. Something about how normal he looked right then, when just minutes before he’d been little less than a crazed animal, unsettled Izaya.

After a few seconds, he bent down and ripped the second button off the boy’s gakuran. Pocketing it, he left.


	3. That Night

“Do you remember when we first met?”

Izaya looked away from the TV. He met Shizuo’s eyes. A commercial break aired through the beast's apartment, and right then, he couldn’t recall what they’d actually been watching.

“What?”

Shizuo raised his eyebrows. “When we met,” he said. “At Raijin. You remember, right?”

Of course he remembered.

“Yes,” Izaya said. “What of it?”

Shizuo glanced at him. He pulled in on his cigarette, blowing smoke out through the open balcony doors.

“That gakuran looked good on you.”

Izaya blinked.

“I know,” he said. He picked at a pillow on his end of the couch. “Pity I can’t dress like that nowadays, people wouldn’t take me seriously.”

“I was just thinking – it’s weird, you know.” Shizuo shifted against his pillows. “That was the first thing I thought when I saw you.”

Izaya looked over. He scoffed.

“No, it wasn’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“That wasn’t the look of admiration,” he said. He pulled at a thread on his pillow. “If anything, you were thinking about how to throw me off the roof.”

“I wasn’t admiring you. I was seriously pissed off someone could look that good in those uniforms. Mine barely fit.”

Izaya rolled his eyes. He could say that’s because Shizuo was a hulking monster, even at thirteen. He could tell him he still had that button from his gakuran. He could call Shizuo out for flirting.

“Do you really expect me to believe that?” he said.

“It’s the truth.”

Izaya believed him.

“I don’t believe you.”

Shizuo scowled. “Whatever.”

The show, or movie, came back on, but neither of them paid it any attention. Shizuo smoked his cigarette, looking out at the chilly night. He seemed to be listening to cars driving and sirens wailing somewhere far, far away. Izaya watched.

“Do you want to know what my first thought about you was?” he said.

“Sure.”

“Really?”

Shizuo gave him a look. Izaya regarded him for a moment, then shook his head.

“Never mind, I don’t think you _really_ want to know.”

Shizuo scowled. “Izaya.”

Izaya smiled. He pulled his legs up on the couch.

“Nope,” he said. “I’m not telling.”

“Just tell me.”

“Nope.”

“Izaya. I’m not playing this game with you.”

“What game?”

“Fuck off.”

“I’ve never heard of that one – how do you play?”

Izaya laughed as Shizuo threw a pillow at him. It wasn’t a real throw – he let it hit him.

“Izaya!” he growled.

“Okay, okay.” Izaya put his hands up. “Do you really want to know?”

“Yes, I wanna know!”

Izaya leaned forward, and he lowered his voice, quieter than the TV.

“The first time I saw you, Shizuo, I thought: wow, this idiot’s been walking around with his fly open all morning –”

Shizuo chucked another pillow at him, and Izaya caught it, laughing.

“I didn’t have my fly open!”

“Yes, you did!” He didn’t. “It was hilarious!”

Shizuo scowled. “Great,” he said. “Another reason to hate that day…”

“Another?”

“Other than meeting you?”

Izaya stilled. He hugged the pillow Shizuo threw at him. It was warm.

“Ah,” he said. “Right, of course.”

Shizuo stared. Izaya felt the few feet of space between them, suddenly, like the gap in that building’s ceiling, eleven years ago. Except this time, he knew he couldn’t make the jump. After a few seconds, Shizuo put out his cigarette. Another commercial break aired on the TV.

“Izaya,” he said. “Do you remember when we first kissed?”

Izaya met Shizuo’s eyes.

“Yes.”

“You had that same look.”

“What look?”

Shizuo chuckled. So close, so far.

“I dunno,” he said. “Like…I just stabbed you or something.”

Izaya felt himself smile. “That’s because you’re such a bad kisser.”

Shizuo wouldn’t look away. Instead, he looked like he wanted to come over, to rip the pillow out of his arms. Replace it with the real thing.

“I was,” he said.

Izaya arched an eyebrow. Neither of them moved. Because they knew better. They couldn’t risk losing this game. This game that kept them on tenterhooks every time they met up, daring them to touch, knowing that the moment they did, nothing would be left after but hate.

“Vorona’s a lucky girl,” he said.

Shizuo just smiled.


	4. Hospital Visits

Izaya scrolled through the messages on his phone. Biology club business, girls, Russian spam, contacts from Kaisei, girls, forwarded messages from other clubs, more girls.

Russian?

Izaya was about to click on this when Shinra tugged at his arm.

“Izaya!” he said. “Come on, I got the room number.”

Izaya looked at Shinra’s excited face. He sighed.

They were at the hospital. Specifically, Tokyo University Hospital, where one Heiwajima Shizuo, aka the Kaisei Beast, was currently a patient. Izaya had seen their ambulance go by yesterday, and since Shinra was hell-bent on getting a closer look, he told him which hospital. He didn’t know Shinra would want to drag Izaya along.

Izaya didn’t go anywhere he didn’t want to, as a rule, but Shinra kept on lecturing him again about using the Biology Club as a gambling ring. This was the best way he could think of to shut him up.

On the way to the room, he thought of all the other things he could be spending his afternoon on. Preparing for the first Biology club meeting that week, contacting people who still had debts, asking around about Kozue and Chieko, visiting Kaisei Middle School, etc. etc.

Shinra opened the door.

The room had two occupants. The nearest looked to be some yakuza member – large and bald with dragon tattoos peeking out from his tight-fitting shirt. He glared at them as they walked past. Shinra simply ignored him, but Izaya smiled and waved.

Past the divider, they saw Shizuo. He was also scowling, but he didn’t look as bestial as before. Maybe it was the bandages, or the fact that he didn’t measure up to real yakuza. Probably because he wasn’t chasing after Izaya like some hellish monster.

An elementary schooler, from the looks of it, was in the chair by Shizuo’s side. He had the same shade of long, brown hair and bored eyes; a pretty face that reflected Shizuo’s.

His little brother.

Shizuo jumped up when he saw Izaya, eyes widening.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” he yelled.

Izaya smiled, opening his mouth only to have Shinra elbow him in the ribs. The little brother stared at them.

“I’m Kishitani Shinra. We haven’t met yet, but you know my friend, Orihara Izaya-kun. He’s come to apologize for being such as asshole to you yesterday –”

“Have I?”

“– and we were wondering if you wanted to be friends!”

Shizuo blinked. He furrowed his eyebrows. “What?”

“My thoughts exactly.” Izaya turned towards Shinra, smiling. “First of all, Shizu-chan here was the one who threatened to kill me yesterday. Second of all –”

“You trapped me on the fucking roof!”

“Secondly, I would like to know why you brought me here if you wanted to be friends with Shizu-chan –”

“Stop calling me that!”

“And thirdly, do you really expect me to associate myself with an idiotic brute like him?”

Shizuo shoved him. Caught off guard, Izaya stumbled back into the curtained divider, and it ripped when the beast jumped on him.

Shinra cried out. Izaya didn’t.

He struggled to take out his knife, but Shizuo grabbed his arms, pinning them above his head with one hand. He pulled the other back to punch him, and Izaya turned his head, waiting for the blow, but then Shinra tackled Shizuo, managing only to pile on top of them and making it near-impossible to breathe; still, Izaya got a reprieve as Shizuo tried to deal with Shinra. He squirmed, freeing his arm enough to reach his knife, but then through all the yelling and flailing limbs, a louder voice shouted, “SHUT UP!”

Shizuo and Shinra’s weight abruptly disappeared. In their place a shadow fell over him, and, gasping for air, Izaya looked up to see the yakuza patient glaring at them all.

“I want some peace and quiet here _now_ or I’m going to kill all of you!” he said. When no one said anything, he grabbed a plastic water pitcher and held it up like a weapon.

“GOT IT?”

Shizuo just glared back, his hands twitching. Probably itching to wrap around the man’s throat. Izaya took the initiative.

He stood up, brushing himself off.

“Igarashi-san, was it?” he said. He faced the yakuza, smiling. “My sincerest apologies.”

Igarashi blinked. He scowled, but also lowered the water pitcher.

“How’d you know my name?” he said.

Izaya smiled. He nodded his head towards the entrance.

“It’s posted outside the door.”

Igarashi looked in that direction, probably thinking of going to check if his name was actually there, but right then a harried-looking nurse rushed into the room.

“What’s going on here?” she said.

Everyone froze, except for Izaya.

“Onee-san, thank god you’re here!” he said. He stepped off the divider. “The curtain just caught on fire!”

“What?!”

Izaya gestured to the yakuza. “But don’t worry, onii-san here took care of it for us. Didn’t you?”

Igarashi looked at Izaya, dumbfounded. Slowly, his gaze slid over to the water pitcher in his hand.

“Er, yeah,” he said. After a pause, he added, “You’re welcome.”

The nurse looked around the smoke- and char-free room. She looked confused for a second, but then her pager started beeping. She checked it. Sighing, she glanced back at the still room.

“There are nurses right outside if you need anything,” she said. She addressed this to Shinra, whom she’d somehow deemed the most trustworthy.

Shinra nodded, but it was Izaya who said, “Thank you, onee-san.”

She left, though not without a last, lingering glance, especially at Izaya. Everyone turned to look at him as well. He took in this attention, breathing it in, then smirking, he faced Igarashi.

“Thanks for playing along,” he said. “It feels like we’re partners in crime now, don’t you think?”

“What?” Igarashi said.

Izaya put his hands in his pockets. He felt the knife there, and resting his thumb on the switch, he laughed.

“But I would try to keep a low profile from now on, onii-chan. After all, you already stand out enough as it is.”

Igarashi narrowed his eyes. “What are you trying to say, boy?”

He shrugged.

“Just some friendly advice. Anyway.”

Leaving the stupidly blinking man, he crouched down next to the elementary school kid, who had not moved once since Shinra and Izaya came in.

“You must be Shizu-chan’s little brother.”

The kid just stared back at him, unblinking, like an eternally jaded doll. Izaya opened his mouth to say something else, intrigued, but then slammed it shut when Shizuo shoved him.

“Get away from him, you creep!” he said.

Izaya just managed to keep his balance. He straightened up, frowning. Quickly, he smoothed his face and put a hand over his heart, eyes wide.

“Creep?” he said. He cocked his head, letting his lips curl. “You wound me.”

Shizuo didn’t look the least reassured by this. On the contrary, he placed himself between his brother and Izaya, eyes murderous.

“Get the fuck out of here,” he growled. “Before I tear your arms out of your fucking sockets.”

Izaya stared at Shizuo – at his defensive stance, his glaring, light-brown eyes. He felt a sudden thrill, from the base of his spine to the back of his neck. It was the same thrill he felt when Shizuo attacked him the first time, in that demolished classroom. It was the thrill of challenge, of danger, of an unknown. Like listening to a bomb tick down.

Izaya opened his mouth – ready to set the trigger – when a soft voice spoke.

“Onii-san.”

Shizuo stilled. He looked over at his little brother. The doll stared back with the same blank expression, but as for Shizuo, at least ten different emotions seemed to flicker through his face.

Izaya watched this exchange happen with interest. He wasn’t sure what it meant, but he was sure he’d find out.

Eventually, Shizuo sighed. He looked at Shinra.

“What was your name again?” he said.

Shinra brightened up.

“Kishitani Shinra.” He stuck out a hand. “Nice to meet you!”

Shizuo looked like he’d rather stick a pencil up his nose than shake Shinra’s hand, but he did, if only for a quick second.

“Nice to meet you,” he mumbled.

Then he turned to Izaya.

“You,” he said.

Izaya smirked. “I have a name.”

“Do I look like I give a fuck?”

“You do, actually.”

Shizuo growled. Actually growled, like an animal, and Izaya felt the beginnings of that thrill again. He put a hand in his pocket. At the last second, however, the beast seemed to remember himself.

He shook his head, glaring.

“I don’t get what your fucking problem is, and I don’t care,” he said. “Just get out.”

“After I came all the way here to visit you?” Izaya shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Izaya…”

He smiled. “Ah! You remembered.”

“That your name, then?” said a voice behind them.

Izaya turned to face Igarashi again, raising an eyebrow. He was still holding the water pitcher.

“As it so happens, yes,” he said.

“Then listen here, _Izaya_. I don’t like you. That kid don’t like you. So get the fuck out of here if you know what’s good for you.”

Looking up at the hulking man, he saw the tattoos again, weighed the pros and cons again. It only took a split second to calculate this had less than a thirty percent chance of success, but after all, he’d always been a gambling man. He smiled.

“Alright,” he said. He stepped forward. “I’ll leave on one condition.”

Igarashi tightened his grip on the pitcher. “You leave or I kill you – that’s you’re fucking condition.”

Izaya laughed. “Don’t worry, Igarashi-san,” he said. He cocked his head. “It’s not anything difficult.”

Before Igarashi could say anything else, Izaya came closer, close enough to smell sweat and cheap cigarettes.

“Tell your friends Orihara Izaya says hello.”

Igarashi blinked. Izaya wanted to break out and cheer at the wariness in his face.

“What?” he said.

“You heard me.”

With that, Izaya turned around. “Bye-bye everyone ~! I would say this had been fun, but I hate lying, and frankly, Shizu-chan, you’re not worth it.”

Shizuo curled his hands into fists, his face turning red.

“Izaya…” he said.

He smiled wide.

“See you at school.”


	5. Sensei

Izaya looked out the window. Idly, he watched two students make out under a tree. He recognized one, Suzuki Kozue, but her partner he couldn’t quite place by the back of his head. Maybe a third year?

Sato shifted some papers behind him.

“Shouldn’t you be studying for your English exam this week?” he said.

Izaya chuckled. “What’s the point?” he said. “You’ll give me an A anyway.”

He looked back to see Sato roll his eyes.

Sato Ichiro, a 31-year-old English teacher. With his patient personality and handsome looks, he held an old-world sort of charm. Many of the female staff and quite a few students had sought him out over the years, but he always turned them down. A lot of people wondered why he hadn’t married yet, or at least why he didn’t have a girlfriend. Izaya wasn’t one of them.

“That again?” Sato said. He laughed. “You know I’ve never given you a grade you didn’t deserve.”

Izaya shrugged. After a few seconds, he moved to sit across from his teacher at the table, smiling.

“Why did you become a teacher, sensei?” he said.

Sato didn’t even look up. “Because I like teaching.”

“What do you like about it?”

“I like seeing my students learn and improve.” Sato glanced at him. “You guys always manage to surprise me.”

Izaya smirked. He rested an elbow on the table, head in his hand.

“What about the respect you get as a teacher?” he said. “The power of not only rote knowledge but also age and experience, which you can use against your dim-witted, hormonal students. This so-called power creates a hierarchy in our microscopic replica of society, so that no matter how marginalized you might be in the world outside these walls, in here, you will always exist in a grade above.”

“You really are young if you think teachers hold that much influence here,” Sato said, without missing a beat.

Izaya took this in. He frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I teach English, Orihara-kun, not life experiences.” Sato straightened up a pile of graded essays. “You’ll have to learn that on your own time.”

“But –”

“Also, the power you’re talking about isn’t respect. Respect is a two-way street; it’s not something you can use without losing it.”

Izaya stared at his teacher. Sato looked back.

“Ne~” Izaya said. “How’re things with you and Kobashi-san?”

Sato’s lips thinned at this. Izaya didn’t look away.

Last year, he walked into this exact room after school. He’d followed some adult man there, someone he knew wasn’t a teacher or, by his age, a parent. Listening at the door, Izaya waited. He walked in after several minutes. Sato and his boyfriend, Kobashi Taizo, jumped apart, crashing into the bookshelves, stumbling over a chair, letting papers fly everywhere. Bright red and struggling to zip up his pants, Sato stuttered out an apology.

“You remembered his name?” Sato said now.

“Don’t insult me, sensei,” Izaya said. “I remember everything.”

Sato pulled another pile of papers towards him – his class.

“Then you should remember that I don’t discuss my personal life with my students.”

“We crossed that bridge a long time ago, don’t you think, sensei?”

Sato looked at him again. He sighed.

“We’re fine,” he said.

He glanced over a paper marked with familiar handwriting. Hearts surrounded an obscene doodle on the bottom, but Sato made no remark on this as he scribbled a clear 16/16 on top. Izaya leaned forward on the table, admiring his handiwork.

“That’s funny,” he said. “Because I could’ve sworn I read about Kobashi-san’s wedding announcement in the newspaper the other day.” Izaya sat back, smiling. “Unless it was a different Kobashi Taizo?”

Sato froze. He gripped his red pen tightly. Putting it down, he looked at Izaya.

“So you knew,” he said.

“Of course I knew.”

He frowned. “Then why’d you ask?”

“Why do teachers ask questions they already know the answer to?” Izaya said. “Because I wanted to hear it from you.”

Sato narrowed his eyes.

“It’s not an interesting story,” he said.

“I’ll have to disagree with you there, sensei. I happen to know one or two people who’d _love_ to hear all about it.”

Izaya sat up in his chair, watching as those warm brown eyes glared at him. After several seconds, Sato looked away.

“You really want to know?” he said.

“Yes.”

Sato sighed. He took off his glasses, then ran a hand over his face. Izaya had to wait several moments, but he waited patiently, in silence.

“I saw him with her,” Sato said. His voice was quiet, so different from the classroom. “In this little café we’d always gone to together, which was just…” He laughed bitterly. “When I confronted him about it, he said they’d been dating for years, off-and-on. They got back together months ago and were even planning their wedding. A wedding. I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there. I think I was waiting for an apology, or for something at least, but after a while, I just left. I walked away. I haven’t seen him since, but if I did…I honestly don’t know what I’d do.”

He rubbed at his eyes.

“Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Izaya blinked.

No. Somehow, that wasn’t what he’d wanted to hear at all. Even though his assumptions had been right – as always. Even though he was able to pull this story out of his teacher like no one else could.

He smiled.

“If you want revenge, sensei, I am an eye-witness to your relationship with him. There’s nothing that breaks up a happy marriage quite like homosexual tendencies – or affairs, for that matter…”

Sato’s unusually grave face relaxed at this, and he let out a soft laugh.

“Thank you for the offer,” he said. He leaned back in his chair. “But I’d rather just let it be.”

“Are you sure?” Izaya straightened up. “I could arrange a little meet-up with his blushing bride. It wouldn’t be that difficult, not really, and while I do that, you could meet with Kobashi-san, then I’d bring her to see you two together, and –” 

“Orihara-kun.”

Sato just stared at Izaya. It wasn’t a look the calm, smiling teacher wore often – it wasn’t a look anyone really gave Izaya – and it felt wrong, to be so blatantly analyzed like that, by the warm, patient man sitting not two feet away.

Izaya looked away.

“Is this Shizu-chan’s?” he said. He snatched up one of the nearest papers, staring at the messy scrawl. On top, the beast had written out his name in barely legible characters. The rest of the paper was full of Sato’s red marks.

He laughed. “I knew he was an idiot, but this is just…”

“Put it back, Orihara,” Sato said, frowning.

Izaya glanced at him. Swiftly, he took out his phone and snapped a picture of Shizu-chan’s dismal paper before placing it, neatly, back on its pile.

Sato sighed. That weird look disappeared, much to Izaya’s relief. He went back to grading papers.

“You should try to get along better with Heiwajima-kun,” he said.

“We get along just fine.”

Izaya looked over the paper on his phone, smiling.

Sato gave him a look. “I don’t think you should tease him so much. You know he’s a sensitive kid.”

Izaya laughed. “Sensitive?” he said. “Sensei, are you sure we’re talking about the same Shizu-chan?”

Sato rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. You should stop provoking him all the time.”

“Ah, but sensei, he’s just too amusing to ignore.”

“I didn’t say ignore him. Just be nicer to him.”

“I don’t see the difference.”

Sato shook his head, but Izaya could see his lips almost smiling.

“Just try, please?” he said. “For me?”

Izaya smiled. “We’ll see~.”

The bell eventually rang, signaling the end of their lunch break. Sato shooed Izaya away, but when he walked out, he paused in the hallway. Frowning, he pulled out his phone. He found the picture he took of Shizuo’s homework, and he stared at it, hesitating. After a few seconds, he sighed.

He pressed delete.


	6. Dreams

Izaya leaned back in his chair. He closed his eyes against the glare of his computer screens, rubbing at them until he saw spots. He sighed. A car started up somewhere in the distance. Invisible birds chirped at the rising dawn. Turning around, he opened his eyes to see the lightening sky through his floor-to-ceiling windows, and not for the first time, he wondered if he should get some damn curtains.

Like the ones at Shizuo’s place. The ones that blocked out all sunlight, so that if they wanted, the nights would never end.

Izaya laughed softly.

It was just like the idiot, to get him all caught up in memories again. He should have slaughtered the beast when he had the chance. One of the many regrets he had from his time with the humanoid monster he’d once called his lover.

Why did Shizuo have to kiss him in the first place, all those years ago? Why did he start this? And why couldn’t they just end it – whatever ‘it’ was between them now. Endless nights that came maybe twice last year, four times already this year.

What was wrong with him? 

Izaya looked away from the windows. He reached down to the bottom drawer of his desk, opening it to reveal piles of paper, odd knickknacks, and a few battered-looking phones. He grabbed the oldest one – a chipped, black flip phone that sported a worn sticker of a smiling bear on its back.

He held it in his hands for a few seconds, as if admiring the years etched into every scratch and line. Finally, he opened it and pressed down on the orange ‘end’ button until the small screen came back to life.

The background showed a teddy bear, sitting on some table, with the shape of a Ferris wheel in the distance. Someone was giving it bunny ears.

Izaya gave a grim smile at this. He moved on to look at the phone’s inbox. The last received message was from the contact, _S-chan_. Sent at 1/1/20XX 12:16, it said:

_dinner?_

Izaya pulled his legs up on his chair, wrapping an arm around them as he clicked through the other messages.

_11/9/20XX 8:45 morning_

_7/31/20XX 14:52 miss u_

_4/17/20XX 22:01 where r u_

_2/15/20XX 7:33 got ur hw_

_12/3/20XX 10:55 lunch?_

_9/30/20XX 18:37 i dont hate you_

_9/30/20XX 18:30 im sorry_

The rest was much of the same. Shizuo had never been one for texting, or using phones for that matter. Still, Izaya couldn’t help but read every single word, just as he’d done countless times before, all the way back to the first message the beast had ever sent him:

_10/30/20XX 12:24 here_

Izaya stared at this for a long while. Day had brightened into blue skies by now, a true dawn free from any of night’s lingering quiet. He stayed huddled in his chair, his body dead tired, and his mind, for once, numb.

The idiot had always had that sort of effect on him. Striking him dumb, chasing his thoughts away from yakuza, gang wars, pet projects, humans. Focusing everything, instead, on the least human-like being ever to have existed.

The previous night would be the last – for a while, at least. It had been the same procedure the last time some unfortunate soul was blind enough to date Shizuo. Back then, they didn’t meet at his place for almost two years. Because the idiot could pretend all he wanted, talking and smoking as if nothing had changed, but they both knew he was kissing and fucking someone else. Even now, that made all the difference in the world.

Izaya turned off the phone.

He tossed it back in the bottom drawer, slamming it shut. Cursing the bright outdoors, he shuffled away from his desk to collapse on his cool couch. He buried his face in a pillow and felt sleep overtake him. He hoped his dreams wouldn’t stray anywhere near the past, that, in fact, he wouldn’t dream at all. But quietly, secretly, as his consciousness slipped, he wished sleep would whisper Shizuo’s words back to him as the beast himself used to once, on sunny days just like this one.


	7. After School

It was a month after the start of school. By now, most everyone knew about the ‘Kaisei Beast’ not just from rumors, but from actually watching the monster chuck a cafeteria table out the window or rip lockers off the wall.

Izaya tried not to get involved, but well. His self-restraint only went so far.

The beast talked to Shinra, weirdly enough. After their hospital visit, Shizuo seemed to accept Shinra’s presence like people accepted gnats in the summer, or rain in spring.

Shinra actually stopped having lunch with Izaya. Instead, he decided to put that time aside for Shizu-chan. Izaya offered to join, but smiling, Shinra told him, “Join and I’ll find a way to slip hydrochloric acid into your juice-box.”

Izaya ate lunch with Chieko-chan now.

They always had plenty to talk about – at least, Chieko did. Apparently, her relationship with Kozue had become strained over winter. She’d gotten a boyfriend – the ever-loyal Chieko was elusive as to who – and since then, her and Chieko never hung out anymore. Not that she’d ever been that good of a friend anyway. According to Chieko, she was constantly dumping her problems on her, never listening to what she had to say, always ordering her around, etc. etc.

Izaya was always sympathetic.

After school, the Biology Club was doing even better than last year. This was mostly due to the increased members, but also Izaya’s growing reputation. His constant fights with Shizuo had made him almost as infamous in their school. It was a convenient way to spread the word, but such childish fights weren’t exactly the kind of image he’d been wanting to make of himself.

And yet, the temptation.

“ _IZAYAAAA!”_

Izaya leaned over the rooftop, watching as Shizuo beat the shit out of their school’s soccer team. Someone might have led them to believe that the Kaisei Beast was responsible for their loss against the Kaisei team last Saturday.

Shizuo neared the last man standing, uttering his now-familiar warcry:

“IZAYAAA!”

He’d rush through the school after, looking for him. Despite how idiotic he seemed, the brute always knew, somehow, when it was Izaya testing him.

Not that he ever had any proof.

The rest of the school poked their heads out from the windows, watching as well. In the beginning, the bold ones had always crowded around Shizuo’s fights, curious to see how the beast dealt with his enemies. He always made sure to give them first-hand experience, sooner rather than later. Only teachers hovered around his fights now, though none of them ever dared to intervene. Most of them fidgeted around while holding first aid kits, or occasionally dragged unconscious kids out of harm’s way.

Izaya would have to find better prey for Shizuo in the future. Even after a month, this scene was close to getting repetitive. He should get people who could give him a real challenge, or at least a fight that lasted more than five minutes. Maybe he could make the beast famous not only in their school, but all of Tokyo…

A few seconds later, the last member of the unfortunate Raijin soccer team keeled over. He’d been hit in the stomach with a pole Shizuo had managed to dismantle from the goalpost. The monster.

Izaya sighed. Now that the show was over, he decided to make himself scarce. He was already late to pick up Mairu and Kururi from daycare, though he was positive they could manage the walk home by themselves, as Mairu constantly reminded him. Anyway, he wasn’t in the mood to play with Shizu-chan today.

As he turned to leave, however, he felt his phone vibrate with a new message. He checked it on impulse.

  * Позвоните нам по этому номеру для возможности пропуска! ~~ <3<3



Izaya stared. More spam? He hesitated a second before typing.

  * _May I help you?_



The reply came almost instantly.

  * Да



He frowned.

  * _I don’t read Russian._



He’d barely sent the message when a new one came through.

  * Увидимся в 8.



Izaya raised an eyebrow. Eight? Eight what? What eight? He started typing.

  * _Can you understand me?_



A few seconds, then:

  * Да



Maybe this was spam after all…

  * _Can you send me a question mark?_
  * ?
  * _Please send another question mark_
  * ?
  * _Now the number ‘8’_
  * 8



Not spam, then. Izaya felt himself smiling.

What did this person want? Why did he or she disguise their first message as spam? Why not use Japanese? Maybe they only had a Russian keyboard, which was implausible in Japan, but maybe they were a foreigner, but then how did they get his phone number – looked as if they typed in a random Japanese number…maybe the spam was a code to find someone or to relay some message, but they didn’t have the whole number, so his was caught in the crossfire?

  * _Let’s start over. What is ‘yes’ in your language?_
  * Да
  * _What is ‘no’?_
  * Нет
  * _Do I know you?_
  * Нет
  * _Do you know me?_
  * Нет
  * _Would you like to know me?_
  * Да



Izaya paused. He wasn’t sure what to ask next – being restricted to solely yes or no questions was more limiting than he’d thought. He started mapping out how to ask what ‘8’ had meant for the Russian stranger earlier, when something completely tore him from his thoughts.

“IZAYAAAA!”

Izaya flinched as the door to the rooftop slammed open. Damn. He’d almost forgotten. A furious Shizu-chan, who clearly had not, thundered towards him, his ill-fitting uniform stained and torn at the seams.

How cute.

“IZAYA!” the beast said.

“Not looking so hot there, Shizu-chan,” Izaya said. He pocketed his phone. “Had a rough day?”

“I’m going to fucking kill you!”

Izaya clicked his tongue.

“ _Language_ , Shizu-chan.”

Shizuo didn’t take this too kindly. He rushed at Izaya like a bull, though unlike the slightly less intelligent animal, when Izaya stepped to the side, Shizuo followed. Cursing, Izaya used every means possible to dodge, duck, and evade Shizuo, who hadn’t seemed to have lost any energy from beating up the school’s entire soccer team. The rooftop had never seemed so small.

He made it through the doorway only to have the beast follow him down the stairs, around the corner, through the halls.

It was after school, so Izaya couldn’t exactly blend in with a crowd – all he could do was keep running, keep dodging all the crap the idiot threw at him, keep laughing when he missed.

Izaya was doing exactly that when he took a sharp turn around a corner and crashed into someone.

Izaya’s face smacked into a man’s sharp chin, and he heard objects falling, a shout. He also felt warmth. He smelled something like new books and laundry.

Sato groaned, starting to get up.

Izaya – sweaty from the sudden marathon through the school – unstuck himself from his teacher, offering quick apologies. He felt as if someone had injected adrenaline into his chest, and he couldn’t think straight – he could barely talk straight as he looked around at the mess of textbooks and papers around him.

“Sensei, I was just – I was –”

He smacked into Sato again when Shizuo rounded the corner, tripped over them, and fell on top of them both.

Ten minutes later, all three found themselves in the teacher’s office.

Sato sat in front of him and Shizuo, arms crossed.

“This has got to stop,” he said. He was using his teacher voice. “Were you two just going to keep acting like this for the rest of the year? You’re not children anymore. You know better. Especially you, Heiwajima-kun. You’ve already had to transfer once due to your poor behavior in school. Do you want that to happen again?”

Surprisingly, Shizuo looked down at his shoes, biting his lip.

“No,” he said.

Sato nodded. “Of course not. Next time there might not be a school that’ll accept you, and if that happens, even I won’t be able to face your parents. They’ve already gone through so much stress and worry in transferring you here, how do you imagine they’d feel if you couldn’t even graduate?”

Shizuo played with the hem of his torn shirt. From the side, Izaya could see him frowning.

“But it’s his fault,” he said. He shot Izaya a glance.

Izaya still felt a little dazed. The double impact coupled with the run and the burgeoning summer heat must be having their effects on him. It warmed his skin from the inside out, creating a weight that prevented him from lifting his eyes to match Sato’s stern stare. Instead, he looked at Shizuo.

“I didn’t do anything,” he said. “You’re the one who decided you wanted to kill me for no good reason.”

Shizuo glared at Izaya.

“You sent those crazy bastards to attack me! And before, you made me blow up in P.E., and the other week, you sent some other random bastard at me –”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Shizuo clenched his hands into fists, his whole face going red.

“Izaya…” he growled.

“Enough.” Shizuo looked back at Sato – Izaya at his feet. Sato took off his glasses, sighing. “It doesn’t matter whose fault it is.”

“But –!”

“From now on, I want you two to work at the library after school.”

Shizuo stared, open-mouthed. Izaya felt that weird heat drain from his body, and finally, he managed to look at his teacher.

“Sensei –”

Sato spoke over him. “I don’t want to hear it,” he said. “They’ve been short-staffed ever since Mrs. Takamura went on her maternity leave. The both of you will work there until she comes back, or until you two learn how to get along.”

“But –”

“Understand?”

Shizuo stepped forward, his entire face wrinkling into angry lines.

“But sensei, Izaya’s the one who –!”

“Sensei, I’m busy after school, I can’t –”

“ _Do you understand?_ ”

They said nothing. They stood there, fuming in silence, Izaya trying to communicate through glares alone that for a blackmailed person, Sato certainly wasn’t acting like it.

Sato put his glasses back on.

“Great.”


	8. Summer Heat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: THIS MINI CHAPTER CONTAINS EXPLICIT SEXUAL CONTENT
> 
> REALLY. IT IS MOSTLY CONSISTED OF EXPLICIT SEXUAL CONTENT
> 
> IT IS NOT STRICTLY NECESSARY FOR PLOT PURPOSES TO READ THIS CHAPTER 
> 
> PLEASE DO NOT READ IF SUCH CONTENT IS NOT TO YOUR TASTES 
> 
> You have been warned.

Shizuo licked his nipples. It was their last summer before getting jobs, becoming adults, and the slick saliva felt cool against the outside heat, even as the beast stuck to him, hotter than the cement on his back. Izaya tried not to make sounds, despite the empty rooftop, but it was impossible when Shizuo zipped open his pants, massaged his hard-on, tasted him the way he liked. Shizuo kissed him on his aching nipples, down his chest, his stomach, his dick – Izaya jerked, the floor scratching his back. He grabbed Shizuo’s hair, clawing at his scalp. He heard himself cursing as he reached the brink, and then more loudly when Shizuo stopped.

He tugged down Izaya’s pants and underwear, gathering them at his ankles, and he was practically naked now on the school’s rooftop, still warm in the middle of summer. Izaya switched between swearing and pleading as Shizuo slowed down, kissing his inner thigh, leaving bite marks.

Izaya thought he was going crazy.

He dragged his nails on the floor, like a cat, and he was shaking, though Shizuo was shaking too, even as his lips trailed so fucking slow down Izaya’s legs. He kissed his balls, and Izaya made an inhuman noise, then one of surprise as Shizuo lifted him up, forcing Izaya to hook his legs on the beast’s broad shoulders.

Izaya said his name, told him to stop. It was filthy. Shizuo ignored him as his tongue massaged Izaya’s hole and his hands returned attention to Izaya’s dick. His tongue thrust in time with his hands, and Izaya spasmed, not lasting long at all, and even after he’d finished, Shizuo continued, never stopping.

The beast.

Years later, Izaya came to this memory. He breathed hard in the heat of the shower, blinking water out of his eyes. White stained his hand, and he stared at it, trying not to feel anger, regret, sadness, or shame.

Trying not to feel anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry. I'll continue with their slow-burn in the next chapter.


	9. The Deal

“For the last time…”

Izaya grabbed the book out of Shizuo’s hands.

“History is over _there_! Just follow the numbers, you idiot. It’s not that hard!”

Shizuo took the book back, glaring. It was a Friday evening after school, and unfortunately for the both of them, they were stuck re-shelving books in their admittedly impressive library. The place was empty except for them, so Izaya didn’t bother to keep his voice down; not when Shizuo decided to act like a complete moron every five seconds.

“I didn’t ask for your help!” Shizuo said. He didn’t bother to keep his voice down either, but it was still a far cry from his usual shouting and growling.

Izaya threw the book back on the re-shelving cart, which still looked as depressingly full as when they started. Ten minutes ago.

“Well, I can’t afford to have you stumbling around like an overgrown baby all the time, or we’ll never get out of here!” he said.

“I’m not ‘stumbling around’!”

“I’d hardly call what you do walking.”

Shizuo looked ready to punch him, and to be honest, it was a miracle he hadn’t already. Maybe the beast was finally learning some self-restraint.

“Shut the fuck up, Izaya,” he said. “I mean it.”

“Then re-shelves those books like someone with a brain, Shizu-chan.”

Izaya nearly bit his tongue when Shizuo shoved him, his body hitting the bookshelves.

“You wanna fight, flea?” Shizuo said. He was shouting now. Izaya rubbed the back of his head, glaring back.

“You’re the one always itching for a fight, beast.”

“Because of you!”

Izaya laughed, though it was partly true.

“Me?” he said. “I’m not the one who throws things through the ceiling and sends people to the hospital every other day.”

Shizuo kicked a stray book near their feet. It ricocheted off into a different aisle.

“No, you’re the one who makes me do it!” he said.

“I didn’t make you get expelled from your last school, did I?” he said. “Instead of trying to blame innocent people –”

“ _Innocent_?”

“– reexamine your own actions first –”

Izaya felt himself slam into the bookshelves again, this time with Shizuo’s fists grabbing the collar of his uniform.

“I hate you,” he said.

Izaya smirked. His head throbbed. “Likewise.”

Shizuo pushed him further into the shelves, shaking a few books off of them. He heard the dull thuds as they fell to the floor. The idiot.

“Stop smiling!” Shizuo growled. “I swear I wanna fucking kill you every time I see your face.”

“Do you?”

Izaya took out his switchblade and slid the sharpened point under Shizuo’s shirt. He reveled in the way the beast’s eyes widened.

“How do you think I feel?”

They stared at each other, saying nothing.

Shizuo let go.

Izaya stumbled back to his feet, his grip still tight on the switchblade. Shizuo stood there, opening and closing his fists, a vein throbbing in his red forehead. After a moment, he let out a yell, then grabbed the closest thing to him – the re-shelving cart – and threw it across the room. He turned back to face Izaya.

“I hate you,” he said. “I want to rip your fucking face off and throw you out that window, but I can’t – I won’t – get expelled again.”

“Out of curiosity, what got you expelled the first time?”

Shizuo shoved him again, and Izaya had to shut his eyes this time, trying to think through the pain.

“I can’t fucking stand you!” Shizuo said. “Do you want me to beat you up? Is that what you want?”

He opened his eyes.

“Touch me one more time,” Izaya said. He raised his knife, pointing it at Shizuo’s chest. “I dare you.”

Shizuo knocked his hand aside. Hashimoto Makoto’s knife went skidding off somewhere, and a sharp pain shot up through his arm.

“Stop. Talking,” Shizuo said.

Slowly, Izaya tried to close his hand. He flinched.

“What are you?” he said. He laughed a little, looking up at him. “Not human, for sure. Maybe an alien?”

“What?”

Izaya met the beast’s eyes. “I’m saying I hate you too.”

“I’ll kill you –”

Shizuo grabbed Izaya’s arm, and Izaya couldn’t help it. He closed his eyes, flinching, his wrist throbbing. To his surprise, Shizuo let go.

“What…?” Shizuo looked at his arm. “What happened?”

He wasn’t relieved. He wasn’t grateful. He opened his eyes.

“What do you think?”

Izaya tried to close his hand again. He hissed. What would happen if he stabbed the beast, right then and there?

Shizuo ran a hand through his hair, cursing.

“Shit, you’re the fucking problem!” he said. “You made me blow up and now this – god! Come on.”

He started storming out of the aisle, and Izaya stared after him, alarmed.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he said.

Shizuo stopped. He turned back around with this idiotic look on.

“The clinic,” he said. “Are you coming or not?”

Izaya scoffed. “How stupid can you get?” he said.

The face switched back to angry. “What?”

Izaya sighed. He leaned back on the bookshelves. “You think showing up with me in tow will get us out of here any quicker? Or help your case with Sato-sensei? Use your brain for once, Shizu-chan.”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

Pain shot up his arm again. Izaya wanted to kill him.

“Everything!” he said. “If the nurse sees that you were fighting again, she’ll report it to Sato, and he’ll think we need to stay in this library until the end of time.”

Shizuo looked at him like he was crazy. He shook his head.

“We can worry about that stuff later,” he said. “We gotta go to the clinic. What if I seriously hurt you?”

Izaya stared. He had never felt more frustrated in his life.

“What is wrong with you?” he said.

Shizuo’s face screwed up. “What?”

“What. Is. Wrong. With. You?” Izaya said. He threw up his hands, but then immediately regretted it. He breathed in sharply. “One second you’re a horrific beast, then the next, you’re all concerned for my wellbeing? Are you bipolar, dissociative, or something else altogether?”

“What’s wrong with _you_?” Shizuo said. “You get hurt, you go to the clinic. Why’re you trying to make it so complicated?”

Izaya jabbed a finger at him. “You’re the one trying to complicate things!”

“ _What_?”

Izaya ran a hand over his face. He took a deep breath, trying to back off. He was getting nowhere with the brute, and the dull throbbing in his wrist was starting to get annoyingly painful. He took a step back.

“Forget it,” he said. “I’m leaving.”

Izaya started walking down the aisle, towards the exit. Shizuo followed.

“You’re going to the clinic?” he said.

He was going to _kill_ him. Izaya grit his teeth. “No.”

“Then where the fuck are you going?”

Izaya stopped by the front desk. Really, it was lucky for them they didn’t have a supervisor, though he didn’t feel very lucky at the moment. He whirled around.

“Let’s make a deal, Shizu-chan,” he said.

Shizuo stopped in his tracks.

“What?”

“A deal,” Izaya said, slowly. “Wherein you do two favors for me, and I will concede in doing two favors for you.”

Shizuo clenched and unclenched his fists.

“Why two?” he said.

Izaya smiled. “Because there are only two things I want from you, at the moment. Do you want to know what they are?”

“Are you gonna go to the clinic if I listen to you?”

This fucking idiot. Izaya almost gave up and walked out the doors. He kept his smile up.

“Maybe,” he said.

Shizuo thought it over. Izaya could see it all in his face – the indecision, the suspicion. He seemed a bit human in that way, and for a moment, he felt proud of being able to tame this beast, if only for a little while.

“All right,” he said. “What is it?”

He smiled wider. With his other hand, he held up one finger.

“First, no more fights. Not with me, not with anyone. Not until Sato releases us from this damn library.” Shizuo looked shocked by this condition, then angry. He opened his mouth. “In return,” Izaya continued, talking over him, “Everything you’ve accused me of before will not happen again during that period of time.”

Shizuo blinked. He closed his mouth. Opened it.

“You’ll stop bothering me?” he said.

Izaya leaned back on the reception table. Must he spell everything out with this idiot?

“One favor from me,” he said. “One favor from you.” He held up two fingers. “Second, lunch.”

“Lunch?”

Izaya pretended to examine his fingernails. “Yes,” he said. “You’ve stolen my lunch buddy, and I think it’s time I got him back.”

Shizuo looked even more bewildered by this request. “You want to eat lunch with Shinra?” he said.

“You can join us, if you want,” Izaya said. He looked back at Shizuo. “I’m not so cruel as to force you to eat lunch by yourself.”

Shizuo stared. “Wait, but that’s it?” he said. “You want me to stop fighting, and you wanna eat lunch with us?”

“In return, I will stop provoking you…” Izaya grimaced, but continued. “…and I will owe you one favor.”

The beast looked wary, as if he was making a deal with the devil. Izaya knew that look all too well – it was the look everyone had when they started up in his Biology Club, it was the look they had when Izaya offered them deals in place of debts. Maybe Shizuo wasn’t too different from them after all.

Suddenly, Shizuo smiled, the way he did just before a fight. Izaya narrowed his eyes.

“A favor, huh?” he said. “Fine.” He stuck out a hand. “It’s a deal.”

Slowly, Izaya took it. They shook once, perfunctory, before letting go. He smiled too.

“Lovely doing business with you.”

Shizuo ignored this. He closed his hand, shifting from foot to foot.

"Now will you go to the clinic?" he said.

Izaya laughed.


	10. Good Morning

Before he opened his eyes, Izaya knew where he was. A musky smell with some spice to it, the suggestion of bitter smoke. He knew the feel of the bedsheets, of the lumpy pillow, and the soft, worn blanket tucked around him. The sounds were familiar too: old-timey music the upstairs neighbor played every morning, distant cars driving past. Izaya thought he could hear Shizuo smoking out on the balcony, his breaths going in and out.

The doors slid open.

“You awake?”

Izaya rubbed his eyes.

“What am I doing here?” he said.

His voice came out all hoarse and scratchy. If he was the type to blush, he would have. Instead, he cleared his throat and sat up. He looked around: an ugly, brown throw-blanket on top of the couch, a TV playing cartoons. Off-white walls and a deep-blue table with a crystal ashtray that Izaya had stolen once from a ritzy hotel. A yellow rug spread over the creaky, wooden floorboards, a bookcase without books. A few framed photos here, some cards there. Next to the TV, an old, stuffed bear.

Yes, Izaya knew exactly where he was.

He was still wearing his clothes, though Shizuo must have taken off his belt and shoes. He wriggled his bare toes.

Shizuo plopped down on the couch.

“You fainted,” he said.

Fainted? Doing what? Izaya flashed through a hundred horror scenarios before memories of the previous – day? hour? – came back to him.

Right.

He’d been fighting Shizuo. They’d crossed paths in Ikebukuro, accidentally. He remembered feeling a little dizzy, stumbling and tripping over things – taking a hit from Shizuo didn’t help. The summer heat must have gotten to him as well. He cursed the hot weather.

Izaya grimaced.

“Thanks for that,” he said. He pushed the covers off him. “But next time, don’t bother.”

Izaya made to get up from the bed, but he must have stood up too fast – black and purple spots flickered in his vision as the world tipped sideways. He sat back down.

“When’s the last time you ate?” Shizuo said.

Izaya squeezed his eyes shut.

“What time is it?” he said.

“7:30 in the morning.” The bed dipped, and he knew Shizuo was sitting next to him. “You slept for thirteen hours straight.”

Shit. How many calls and messages and key conversations and crucial moments in the lives of his beloved Tokyo dwellers had he missed while lying, effectively dead, in Shizuo’s apartment?

Izaya put his head in his hands.

If anything, he felt even more exhausted than before.

“I need coffee,” he said.

“You need rest.” He was glaring. Izaya didn’t have to look to know. “And food.”

Izaya took a deep breath. He opened his eyes and stood up, slowly. Hunger gnawed at him with a vengeance, but that would go away after some coffee and an energy bar. He started heading for the door.

“Better watch yourself, Shizu-chan,” he said. Turning around, he winked. “I’ll start to think you care.”

Shizuo stood up.

“Izaya,” he said.

“What is it?” Izaya stood by the doorway, trying not to make it too obvious he was leaning on the frame for support. “I’m quite busy at the moment, but if you’d like a word, you could always call my assistant and –”

Izaya’s stomach let out a long, angry growl. He tried to keep his face blank.

“Schedule an appointment.”

Shizuo raised his eyebrows.

“Wait here,” he said. “I’ll heat up some porridge for you.”

“I don’t need –”

Shizuo walked past, placing a hand on his shoulder. The touch was casual and just as gentle as he remembered.

“Lie down,” he said.

He went off into the kitchen, leaving Izaya standing there.

He could leave. If he pushed Shizuo a little more, he’d let him go. He’d have to, or risk crossing a line – the line they’d kept up so meticulously over the years; the one they both had been dangerously toeing in recent months.

Slowly, Izaya shuffled over to the TV. He picked up the stuffed bear next to it. The short, curly fur had gathered some dust and the color on it had definitely seen better days. Otherwise, though, the small bear showed little sign of its real age. Izaya squeezed the fat, middle part.

“You should lie down.”

He looked over his shoulder. Shizuo was watching him from the doorframe, arms crossed. He was wearing old sweats and a black tee – one of those tuxedo shirts, which Izaya thought was hilarious. He wondered who gave that to him. His yellow hair was a little damp, as if he’d just showered, and the bangs were too long, falling into his eyes.

Izaya looked away.

“Why do you keep this old thing around?” he said. He played with the bear’s arms, mimicking its owner’s punches.

“’Cause I want to.”

“And why do you want to?”

Shizuo leaned against the wall.

“I dunno,” he said. He shrugged. “It’s cute.”

Izaya glanced at him. He smirked. Facing Shizuo, he brought the dusty bear’s face up next to his own.

“As cute as me?” he said.

Shizuo raised his eyebrows, surprised, but he couldn’t hide the small smile that hovered around his lips. He pushed off the wall, looking away.

“Don’t be gross,” he said.

Izaya laughed, a genuine laugh, and this surprised Shizuo too. He stared.

Izaya sat back on the bed, covering his face with the teddy bear.

“You can tell _me_ , Shizuo,” he said. He moved the bear’s arms, pitching his voice silly. “You like me _waaay_ better, right?”

“Izaya…”

“Way, _waaay_ better than that mean yet _devastatingly_ charming Izaya-kun?”

He heard Shizuo laugh; small, involuntary, but there. Izaya smiled. He covered the bear’s mouth, whispering.

“I won’t tell anyone, I _swear_.”

“Izaya, c’mon. Stop it.”

The bear’s arms went to its eyes. It started to sob.

“I knew it!” he said. “You like Izaya better, don’t you?”

Shizuo sighed. Abruptly, his hands were on Izaya’s hands, pulling the bear down. They looked at each other, Shizuo’s amused face just inches away.

“Yeah, I do like you better,” he said. “Happy?”

Izaya said nothing. Shizuo took the bear back. He returned it to its rightful place next to the TV, where it would probably sit, gathering dust, for another decade. The stitched-on mouth almost looked a little sad, as if it really was crying, somewhere on the inside.

Shizuo left to check on the porridge. Izaya stared at the sheets. He listened to the beast bustling around, taking off the lid to the pot, probably getting a faceful of steam. Turning off the stove with a small _click_ , opening his pantry to search for a clean bowl.

“It’s ready,” he called out. “You want to eat in the kitchen or the bed?”

Izaya nearly smiled.

He used to ask this question all the time, didn’t he? When they spent all day in bed – eating, talking, fucking. Back when they were students, back when they were just kids. But even on this bed, back when they thought they were adults, Shizuo would still make him breakfast the morning after. They had lunch sometimes on this bed too, and when they felt like it, dinner. On those days, Shizuo had treated him better than when they were officially together, and Izaya supposed he had played a bit nicer too.

Did he make her meals too? In the morning, afternoon, at night. How many times had they fucked now? More times than they could count, probably. It wasn’t as if Izaya remembered how many times they slept together.

“The bed,” he said.

Which time was the last time? He couldn’t recall.

“Alright,” Shizuo said.

More than anything, that’s what bothered him the most.


	11. Rumors

The sky was a blinding blue. Izaya watched a lone bird sail across the empty expanse, an explorer without purpose. What did it see? Tiny people getting in their cars, getting on the metro, walking on the sidewalks, traveling to school or to work. Meeting their friends, their colleagues, clients. Laughing genuinely or smiling through the pain. One man, one day, stopping to look around, at the street, at the sun, to wonder what life would have been like if he’d only had the courage to follow his dreams.

It saw Izaya lying on the rooftop, jacket beneath his head, staring up at the sky as Shinra and Shizuo sat a little ways off, finishing off their lunch while discussing human evolution (rather, while Shinra talked about it and Shizuo pretended to listen).

“Think about it, Shizuo! What if you have a genetic mutation that will lead to the next generation of humankind? Think of what that’ll look like! Hundreds of years down the line, there’ll be thousands of people strong enough to lift an 18-wheeler with their bare hands!”

“Hm,” Shizuo said.

Izaya stretched, yawning ostentatiously. He turned his head to look at them.

“How many kids are you expecting him to have, Shinra?” he said.

Shinra rolled his eyes, as if he thought Izaya was being dense on purpose.

“As many as it takes,” he said. “Of course.”

“So about a few hundred, then?”

“If that’s what it takes.”

Shizuo choked a little on his food.

“What?”

Izaya laughed. Sitting up, he grabbed an unopened juice box and tossed it to Shizuo. He didn’t like the flavor that much anyway. Shizuo caught it, eyes wide before they narrowed at the box.

“You didn’t poison this or some shit, right?” he said. His voice was scratchy, a little hoarse.

Izaya almost snorted, though he suspected the idiot was being serious. “Don’t worry,” he said. “If I wanted to kill you, you’d know.”

A pause, then, “So, is it poisoned or what?”

Izaya sighed. He wrapped his arms around his knees. “Yes, Shizuo,” he said. “My brilliant plan was to poison you in the middle of the day, on school grounds, in the presence of a witness.” He waved a hand around. “Congratulations! You got me.”

Shizuo grew red, not with embarrassment – could the beast get embarrassed? – but with the unmistakable signs of rage.

Ah. This truce really was more difficult than he could have possibly imagined.

He sighed.

Leaning forward, Izaya took the box out of Shizuo’s hands, unwrapped the plastic straw, and stuck it into the hole. It took a ridiculously long time because he had to use his left hand. His right was in a splint. Eventually, he took a long draw from the stupid box: sugary sweet with the hint of berries. Ugh. He was right to have given it to Shizuo.

Meeting the brute’s eyes, he offered it back.

“Better?” he said.

Shizuo’s eyes were still narrow, his face still red. He didn’t take the box.

“I’m not drinking that,” he said.

This idiot. “You just saw me drink from it, Shizuo. Unless you think I’d go so far as to poison myself –”

“To be fair, I think you would,” Shinra cut in.

Izaya shot him a glare.

“No, it’s gross!” Shizuo was staring at the box like he wanted to set it on fire. “You drank from it! It has your germs and everything.”

“My _germs_?”

“Your saliva,” Shinra said.

Izaya gave him a look. “It doesn’t have my saliva.”

“Yes, it does,” Shinra said. “It’s pretty inevitable. It’s the same concept as kissing – that’s why they call it an indirect kiss, right? Should be fine as long as you’re not sick, Izaya.”

“I’m not sick,” Izaya said. He smiled. Someday, he was going to kill Shinra for even remotely suggesting he wanted to kiss Shizuo. “Even if I was, I’m sure Shizuo’s superhuman body could take it.”

“Keep it,” Shizuo said. “I don’t want it.”

Izaya glared. He handed the box out again. “Stop being and idiot and just take it.”

“I said I don’t want it!”

He opened his mouth to argue back, the words ready on his tongue, but remembering their deal, he stopped. He scowled.

Shinra recaptured Shizuo’s attention. The beast stabbed at his food before transferring it to his mouth, listening or pretending to listen as Shinra chattered on. The chopsticks looked too small in his hands.

A week had gone by since their impromptu deal at the library, and things were running smoother than Izaya had expected. Shinra’s father had said the small fracture in his wrist would take six to eight weeks to heal. It was highly inconvenient to be stuck fumbling around with his left hand, but it wasn’t as if he needed to take notes, or eat anything other than energy bars and juice. Texting was a bitch, but after a week, he was getting the hang of it.

And no more fights with Shizu-chan. The beast did most of the work at the library, with Izaya (gently) instructing him. They ate lunch together, which only reaffirmed much of what he already knew – that Shizuo was a dumb brute that never had much to say, about anything. They passed each other in the hallway without so much as a word, and the rest of the school seemed curious as to why the beast now walked around without his fangs bared 24/7, but they were grateful enough for the peace and calm not to look too much into it.

Sato congratulated them just the other day.

“This proves you can do anything you put your mind to, Orihara-kun,” he said, smiling. “I’m proud of you.”

Izaya leaned against the windowsill, looking down at his fingernails. They needed a trim.

“It’s all thanks to you, sensei,” he said. “It was a very educational experience. Although, I am glad to get back to my normal after-school schedule.”

At the silence, Izaya looked up.

“Keep it up for a couple more weeks,” Sato said. Those brown eyes were calculating again. “Then we’ll talk.”

Izaya stared at Shizuo. He had lain down after finishing his lunch, eyes closed as Shinra debated (mostly with himself) the biological logistics of his existence.

A couple more weeks?

Based on Chieko’s stories, Izaya suspected Kozue-chan was dating someone from the underworld. A gang member, yakuza, drug dealer, prostitute, or a direct relative of the above. He was young, but older than them. In other news, his Russian friend had confided that he (or she) was looking for someone, a female relative around six or seven years old. And just the other day, he had discovered that their math teacher was sleeping with one of the janitors.

So many things were happening. Yet every day, he was forced to waste hours of his time tiptoeing around Shizuo the ticking time bomb.

What was the point of blackmailing someone if they treated you like this anyway?

Maybe he needed a reminder.

Biology club activities were suspended for the time being (another consequence of this farce), but Izaya had the contact information of everyone in it. While Shinra rattled off the names of meaningless theories and theorists, Izaya took out a small flip phone from his pocket. It was a burner phone he’d bought from a store downtown that advertised “100% satisfaction guaranteed – NO REFUNDS”. Izaya typed out the number of Kobayashi Harumi, an honest girl who couldn’t keep a secret for the life of her. Last year, her parents divorced because she’d caught her father fucking her tutor.

In the message box, he hesitated.

“Outside of your abnormal strength, would you say you had a relatively average childhood?”

“Mm,” Shizuo said.

Izaya started typing.

 _“Sato-san?”_ he wrote. “ _The English teacher? Isn’t he gay?”_

He bit his lip. This was necessary. Sato was just like any other – once rumors spread, he would know Izaya had a hand in it, though he’d never be able to prove it. He’d get scared, and act like any scared person would. Izaya would be able to rile Shizuo up again starting as early as next week.

Respect is a two-way street, he said. It’s not something you can use without losing it.

But he didn’t want Sato’s respect. Izaya thought of those warm, brown eyes. That warm, worn smile.

Before he could think about anything else, he hit send.

It took less than a minute.

_“Who is this?”_

His hands were shaking. He hoped Shinra wouldn’t notice.

_“Sorry, wrong number.”_

He switched off the phone. As they gathered up their things from the rooftop, Izaya put it in a plastic bag with the rest of his trash.

“I’m so tired,” Shizuo said. They were walking down the stairs, everyone yawning.

“Same,” Izaya said.

Shizuo blinked at him, surprised, but Izaya pretended not to notice as he tossed his bag into a bin.


	12. Do Me a Favor?

Izaya stared out the window. Chieko was there again, by the tree, but nothing more scandalous than a stolen nap seemed to be occurring this time. Maybe the make-out session with her boyfriend before had been a one-time thing. Maybe they’d broken up. Maybe they’d never been going out in the first place.

Izaya didn’t know. He didn’t seem to know anything anymore.

His mind wandered to the sheet of homework he’d gotten back just earlier that day. A perfect score, as always. Yet on the bottom, Sato had written:

_See me after class._

He left the window. The chair seemed abnormally loud as he pulled it back, the scrape of wood on wood grating his nerves. He bit the end of his thumbnail, a habit he hadn’t been resorted to in a while.

In the past two weeks, the number one topic in Raijin had been Sato Ichiro. Many different rumors had been going around, but each one agreed that Sato, the school’s beloved English teacher, the one all girls fawned over, was completely, one hundred percent, gay.

Whispers and not-so-hidden laughter followed Sato around like shadows. Girls argued between themselves, tossing around what they thought they knew of his previous dating history. Boys made extreme efforts not to be caught alone with Sato, or even to be seen talking to him. Even other teachers had started to avoid him.

Things came to a head on Wednesday when Sato called Watanabe Arata out for always copying his friends’ homework. Sato had kept it light, as he always did, but Watanabe never had liked Sato much in the first place. His girlfriend, Ito Yui from class 3-E, harbored a painfully obvious crush on the handsome teacher.

That day, Watanabe looked Sato straight in the eye and said, “Suck my dick, faggot.”

Izaya stared down at the table. Someone had carved K + S into the wooden surface, faint now but still discernable to the attentive eye. He calculated, briefly, the odds of those initials standing for Sato and his ex-lover. He didn’t seem the type, but neither had he seemed the type to like men, or to hook up with them on school premises.

He put his head down, sighing.

Sato had surely called him here to tell Izaya he could quit working at the library. He knew Izaya could make it worse – it could always be worse. It would be a pain, of course. He would much rather let the rumor die down than take it any further, but Sato didn’t know this.

All in all, mission accomplished.

And yet, he felt nervous. As if he had missed some important detail. As he sat in the room, counting the seconds until Sato arrived, each tick of the clock sounded like a countdown to some irrevocable disaster.

What was he missing?

He reached 326 seconds, exactly, when the door opened.

Izaya snapped his head up. Sato looked at him. He was wearing a wooly, grey cardigan and tan slacks, those coupled with his square glasses giving him more of a college professor look than middle school teacher, and Izaya indulged in a sudden image of Sato reading by the fire, looking up to recite poetry in a voice warmer than the flames.

The door slid shut.

“Hello, sensei,” Izaya said. He tried to smile. “Long time no see.”

Sato stared back stonily. “I just wanted to ask you one thing,” he said. He hadn’t moved away from the door.

Izaya felt his smile twitch. “What is that?”

Sato crossed his arms. A defensive gesture, but it felt more like an attack from where Izaya was sitting.

“Was it worth it?” he said. “I know it was you. Don’t even think of denying it. Why in the world – no. I don’t need to know why. What I want to know is if you think your petty revenge was worth risking someone else’s entire career. They might suspend me because of these rumors. They might even fire me, and then where would I go? No other school will employ me if they think there’s even a small chance I might be gay. Did you know that? Did you even think about it? Wherever I go, this will follow me like a shadow, and it’s all because of a small, thoughtless action you decided to take. And for what? Because I hurt your pride?”

Sato gave a humorless laugh.

“You’re not stupid, Orihara. That’s what confuses me the most. You’re smart enough to know that I wouldn’t walk away from this unscathed. Is that what you wanted? You wanted to hit me where it hurt the most? Because that’s what you did. And now you’ve not only lost my respect, but any and all regard I had for you before you decided to move forward with this scheme. All because you, what, wanted to feel superior?”

Sato uncrossed his arms. He placed a hand back on the door handle.

“Even if they don’t fire me, I’m going to look for positions elsewhere. So, if I don’t see you again, well. I hope you at least got what you wanted.”

Izaya sat still. He had a million things to say, an unbidden apology being one of them, but his teeth had seemed to fuse together; his jaw so tight he felt the strain in his entire body. Forget speaking. He could barely breathe.

Before Izaya could regain control of himself, Sato opened the door. Without waiting for an answer to his supposed question, he walked away.

Izaya collapsed back in his chair like a broken marionette.

Honestly, it could have gone worse. At least he didn’t yell. He didn’t even threaten to tell on Izaya. Belatedly, he realized he’d forgotten to ask about the library.

Izaya leaned forward, covering his eyes with his left hand, which, he realized, was ice cold and shaking so bad he couldn’t make it stop. Breathing was hard, and now his entire body was shaking, a familiar but unwelcome heat growing behind his eyes, and he told himself no, _no_ , he was not crying, not here, not now, but the effort only made his head hurt and his nose run, and despite everything he told his brain, a sob still wracked through him.

Despite the splint, he buried his face in both hands. He tried to block out everything as tears squeezed out from his chest and his throat and his head, wringing every stupid emotion out onto his cold palms.

Pathetic.

Pathetic. Worthless. Useless. A waste of space. A fucking–

The door banged open.

Izaya nearly jumped out of his chair. He looked over at the doorway, blinking tears out of his puffed-up eyes to see…

Oh.

 _Fuck_.

“Izaya?” Shizuo said.

As if it could be anyone else. Dear _god_ did he wish he could be somebody else right now.

Izaya quickly ducked his head.

“Shizu-chan,” he said. It came out all stuffy. “What are you doing here?”

“I, uh, just talked to Sato-sensei. He told me to tell you we can stop working at the library.”

Izaya nearly laughed.

“Great,” he said. “Wonderful.”

A moment of awkward silence passed between them. Izaya debated whether he should endure it or just leave and risk having someone else see him like this. Just as he’d reasoned it was after school and not many people would be around if he left, Shizuo spoke up.

“Are – are you okay?” he said.

Izaya flinched. He tried to subtly wipe his eyes.

“I’m fine.”

“Okay…”

More awkward silence.

“Look, uh,” Shizuo started before tapering off. Izaya resisted the urge to throw something at him. What was the idiot still doing here?

“What?” he snapped. “Just spit it out.”

Izaya didn’t have to look to know he was scowling.

“That favor,” he said, finally. “From before, remember?”

Izaya remembered. He lifted his head to glare at Shizuo, at the gall in asking for something now. Shizuo took this as his cue to go on.

“I know it’s gonna sound weird, but could you, uh, come over? To my house.”

Izaya stared for a good ten seconds. At the end, he sat up straight, turning in his chair to face Shizuo.

“Wait, so. You want me to go to your place? That’s your big favor?”

Shizuo scratched the back of his neck, not quite meeting his eyes.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

He sighed through his nose, like a dog. “My family,” he said. “They keep asking me to bring friends over, and it’s annoying.”

His family? Izaya had seen his little brother before, but it was odd to think of the beast having a mom and a dad, or even something as normal as a house. If Shizuo said he lived by himself in a cave on the outskirts of Tokyo, Izaya wouldn’t have been surprised. He shook his head.

“Why not bring Shinra?”

Shizuo snorted, rolling his eyes. “Yeah, right. I’m not showing that kid where I live.”

“He’s the same age as us.”

“So?”

“So he’s not – nevermind.”

Izaya squeezed his eyes shut. He still had a bit of a headache, and he couldn’t breathe properly through his nose. He couldn’t think straight with all this, and Shizuo wasn’t helping. What he did know was that he had promised the idiot a favor, and no matter what he was, what Sato said he was, Izaya was still someone who kept his promises.

He opened his eyes.

“Fine,” he said.

Shizuo blinked, clearly taken aback. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

Izaya stood up, glancing once at the small carving on the table that may or may not have stood for Kobashi + Sato but which, he supposed, didn’t matter now. He looked back at Shizuo.

“Let’s go.”


End file.
